Tossed like a falcon from the hunter’s wrist,
A sweeping plunge, a sudden shattering noise,
And thou hast dared, with a long spiral twist,
The elastic stairway to the rising sun.
Peril below thee and above, peril
Within thy car; but peril cannot daunt
Thy peerless heart: gathering wing and poise,
Thy plane transfigured, and thy motor-chant
Subdu?d to a whisper — then a silence, —
And thou art but a disembodied venture
In the void.
But Death, who has learned to fly,
Still matchless when his work is to be done,
Met thee between the armies and the sun;
Thy speck of shadow faltered in the sky;
Then thy dead engine and thy broken wings
Drooped through the arc and passed in fire,
A wreath of smoke — a breathless exhalation.
But ere that came a vision sealed thine eyes,
Lulling thy senses with oblivion;
And from its sliding station in the skies
Thy dauntless soul upward in circles soared
To the sublime and purest radiance whence it sprang.
In all their eyries, eagles shall mourn thy fate,
And leaving on the lonely crags and scaurs
Their unprotected young, shall congregate
High in the tenuous heaven and anger the sun
With screams, and with a wild audacity
Dare all the battle danger of thy flight;
Till weary with combat one shall desert the light,
Fall like a bolt of thunder and check his fall
On the high ledge, smoky with mist and cloud,
Where his neglected eaglets shriek aloud,
And drawing the film across his sovereign sight
Shall dream of thy swift soul immortal
Mounting in circles, faithful beyond death.
(Duncan Campbell Scott)
More Poetry from Duncan Campbell Scott:
Duncan Campbell Scott Poems based on Topics: Light, War & Peace, Fire, Death & Dying, Youth, Art, Silence, Sense & Perception, Imagination & Visualization, Fate & Destiny, Work & Career- Lines In Memory Of Edmund Morris (Duncan Campbell Scott Poems)
- Ode For The Keats Centenary (Duncan Campbell Scott Poems)
- The Height Of Land (Duncan Campbell Scott Poems)
- Spring On Mattagmi (Duncan Campbell Scott Poems)
- A Legend Of Christ's Nativity (Duncan Campbell Scott Poems)
- The Battle Of Lundy's Lane (Duncan Campbell Scott Poems)
Readers Who Like This Poem Also Like:
Based on Topics: Light Poems, Death & Dying Poems, War & Peace Poems, Youth Poems, Sense & Perception Poems, Fire Poems, Art Poems, Fate & Destiny Poems, Work & Career Poems, Silence Poems, Imagination & Visualization PoemsBased on Keywords: disembodied, lulling, exhalation, audacity, congregate, unprotected, tenuous, eaglets, eyries, scaurs, motor-chant